- Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension: FBI says it will maintain cover-up attempts
Source: United Press International
“The Federal Bureau of Investigation informed Minnesota’s highest investigative agency that it will not share evidence and information related to the [murder] of Alex Pretti. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension said in a statement that it was informed by the FBI on Friday it would not be sharing any information. … Pretty, 37, was shot multiple times by federal agents on Jan. 24, while observing their activities in the Minneapolis area. He was the second civilian [murdered] in the area by federal agents, weeks after the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good. The FBI has also refused to cooperate with Minnesota authorities in the investigation into Good’s [murder] at the hands of federal agent Jonathan Ross.” (02/16/26)
- Sudan: Strike on market kills at least 28 people, rights group says
Source: ABC News
“Strikes on a market in central Sudan’s Kordofan region killed at least 28 people and wounded dozens, said a rights group on Monday, as the war between the army and a paramilitary group nears its three-year mark. Emergency Lawyers, a rights group tracking violence against civilians, said in a statement that drones bombed a market in Sudri locality in North Kordofan province on Sunday, during a time the market was bustling with civilians, ‘exacerbating the humanitarian tragedy.’ The group said the number of casualties was likely to rise. … The fighting between the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese military erupted into a full-blown war across the country in April 2023. So far, at least 40,000 people have been killed and 12 million displaced, according to the World Health Organization.” (02/16/26)
- Robert Duvall, 1931-2026
Source: Hollywood Reporter
“Robert Duvall, the steely-eyed actor whose performances in the first two Godfather films, Apocalypse Now, The Great Santini, Lonesome Dove and The Apostle made him one of the finest actors of any generation, has died. He was 95. Duvall, who received an Academy Award — one of his seven Oscar nominations — for his performance as an alcoholic country singer in Tender Mercies (1983), died Sunday at home on his Virginia ranch, his wife, Luciana, announced. … Duvall’s line in Apocalypse Now, ‘I love the smell of napalm in the morning,’ became the stuff of movie legend. With jets flying overhead and shells exploding nearby, the scene, shot in the Philippines, was done, amazingly, in one take.” (02/16/26)
- Bangladesh: Yunus resigns as interim PM, handing power to elected government
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“Bangladesh’s interim leader Muhammad Yunus stepped down on Monday before handing over to an elected government led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its leader Tarique Rahman. Bangladeshi voters held national elections and endorsed sweeping democratic reforms via referendum in February following the overthrow of Sheikh Hasina and her iron-fisted government.” (02/16/26)
- Homan says “small” federal occupation force will remain in Minnesota
Source: San Diego Union-Tribune
“White House border czar Tom Homan said Sunday that more than 1,000 [federal gang members] have left Minnesota’s Twin Cities area and hundreds more will depart in the days ahead as part of the Trump administration’s drawdown of its [occupation]. A ‘small’ security force will stay for a short period to protect remaining [gang members] and will respond ‘when our agents are out and they get surrounded by [angry citizens] and things got out of control,’ Homan told CBS’[s] ‘Face the Nation.’ He did not define ‘small.'” (02/16/26)
https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/2026/02/16/trump-border-czar-minnesota-ice-drawdown/
- US, Hungarian regimes sign nuclear cooperation deal
Source: CBS News
“The United States and Hungary signed a civilian nuclear cooperation agreement on Monday, as the Trump administration deepened bilateral ties with a controversial ally at a politically sensitive moment for Budapest. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was in Budapest for meetings with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and senior members of his government, during which Rubio and Orbán signed the pact. The deal comes two months before Hungary’s next parliamentary elections, which may determine whether Orbán can maintain his two-decade grip on power.” (02/16/26)
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-hungary-nuclear-cooperation-trump-deepens-ties-viktor-orban/
- Nigeria: Regime Troops Repel Coordinated Islamist Attacks in Borno
Source: US News & World Report
“Nigerian troops have repelled simultaneous assaults by Islamist militants on two military bases in Borno state, leaving an unspecified number of soldiers dead, the army said on Monday, in some of the fiercest clashes reported in the northeast this year. Borno, the epicentre of Nigeria’s 17-year Islamist insurgency, has seen Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) fighters intensify attacks on both troops and civilians. The weekend’s coordinated assaults targeted Pulka, near the Cameroon border, and Mandaragirau in southern Borno, both long-contested fronts in the fight against Islamist militants. The military said the failed attacks highlight mounting pressure on the insurgents.” (02/16/26)
- Georgia’s January 6 disbarment opinion sets an example for Republicans nationwide
Source: The Hill
by Steven Lubet“The avatars of MAGA-land often appear to operate with almost boundless impunity. President Trump was granted nearly total immunity by the U.S. Supreme Court. He pardoned more than 1,500 Jan. 6 rioters. His officials reflexively defend masked immigration enforcement officials gunning down Minnesota protesters, rather than suspending or at least investigating them. There have been few if any lasting consequences for crimes or malfeasance in Trump world. It was, therefore, truly heartening to see a group of Republicans acknowledge that law-breaking must be meaningfully penalized, even if committed under the MAGA banner. Last month, the nine justices of the Georgia Supreme Court — eight of whom were appointed by Republican governors — unanimously stated that nothing less than disbarment was called for in the case of William McCall Calhoun, Jr., an attorney who had participated in the ‘violent takeover of the Capitol’ on Jan. 6, 2021.” (02/16/26)
https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/5738027-calhoun-capitol-insurrection-disbarment/
- Media Freedom … if We Can Keep it!
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
by Ron Paul“Big media and big government are in bed together and they hate the fact that we can communicate with each other without their filters and influence. They long for the days when they could shovel down our throats just what they wanted us to hear and believe. While we may be winning this battle for free expression, we must not fool ourselves into thinking that we have won the war. We must remember just a few years ago during COVID that all it took to have your platform wiped off the face of the earth was to dare question the “wisdom” of Anthony Fauci. Even today there are forces seeking to use the power of the state to silence opinions they disagree with.” (02/16/26)
http://www.ronpaullibertyreport.com/archives/media-freedomif-we-can-keep-it
- Report: The FBI Bent Its Own Rules To Spy on 1,100 “Sensitive” Targets
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille“If the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) wants to scrutinize a person or organization, it must meet certain legal standards demonstrating evidence to support suspicion of criminal activity before opening an investigation. Well, sort of. It turns out that if the feds can’t meet the bar to justify an investigation, they can move ahead by calling their surveillance efforts ‘assessments.’ Then, they can use the assessments to justify full investigations — assuming FBI agents care to follow the rules to begin with, which is not always the case. That’s led to the feds snooping on roughly 1,100 religious figures, journalists, activists, and public officials in recent years.” (02/16/26)
https://reason.com/2026/02/16/the-fbi-bent-its-own-rules-to-spy-on-1100-sensitive-targets/
- US Economic Growth Looks Slow — Until You Compare It to Europe’s
Source: The Daily Economy
by John Phelan“Over the past decade, the United States has outperformed every other G7 nation. Key measures show why the US is not just getting bigger, but also growing richer.” (02/16/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/us-economic-growth-looks-slow-until-you-compare-it-to-europes/
- Anti-Intellectualism and Violence, Take 2
Source: ProSocial Libertarians
by Andrew Jason Cohen“I am sometimes inclined to believe that anti-intellectualism is new or, if not new, worse now than in the past. In my calmer moments, I don’t believe either claim. I think that what is different now is that we expect more people — perhaps everyone — to be literate and to keep up with national politics. That sounds like a great idea (to democratic theorists anyway) until you think about what people are usually like. Some people want to spend time considering political ethics and discussing the issues of the day or perennial issues. Some of those do so with deep concern and impartiality. Some do not. And, of course, some have no desire to do these things at all. … We can’t make everyone an intellectual. For many people, it would leave them unhappy.” (02/16/26)
https://prosociallibertarians.substack.com/p/anti-intellectualism-and-violence-89c
- Why Not Eliminate All Foreign Aid?
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Laurence M Vance“The Trump administration’s turning off of the foreign aid spigot to some recipients of foreign aid should come as no surprise. Republicans have over the years called for foreign aid to be withheld from one country or another to punish them for doing something particularly egregious or to persuade them to follow a particular course of action. But Republicans have no philosophical opposition to foreign aid. Just like they have no philosophical objection to government grants to the arts unless it funds blasphemous or pornographic art, no philosophical objection to welfare as long as it has some work requirements, and no philosophical objection to antidiscrimination laws as long as they don’t include discrimination against sexual orientation and gender identity. Republicans generally don’t even have any objection to government funding for Planned Parenthood as long as the funding is not used to provide abortions.” (02/16/26)
https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/why-not-eliminate-all-foreign-aid/
- “Kennedy’s Coup” signaled regime change doom loop for US
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Kelley Beaucar Vlahos“A look back at Diem’s assassination, setting off the Vietnam War — who says Washington isn’t led by the same self-destructive characters throughout time?” (02/16/26)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/diem-coup-assasination-vietnam/
- First Gaza, Then the World: The Global Danger of Israeli Exceptionalism
Source: Antiwar.com
by Ramzy Baroud“While many nations occasionally resort to a ‘state of exception’ to deal with temporary crises, Israel exists in a permanent state of exception. This Israeli exceptionalism is the very essence of the instability that plagues the Middle East. The concept of the state of exception dates back to the Roman justitium, a legal mechanism for suspending law during times of civil unrest. However, the modern understanding was shaped by the German jurist Carl Schmitt, who famously wrote that the ‘sovereign is he who decides on the exception.’ While Schmitt’s own history as a jurist for the Third Reich serves as a chilling reminder of where such theories can lead, his work provides an undeniably accurate anatomy of raw power: it reveals how a ruler who institutes laws also holds the power to dismiss them, under the pretext that no constitution can foresee every possible crisis.” (02/16/26)
- The “F” Word
Source: Underthrow
by Max Borders“In his revised thinking/grudging admission about Trump, Jonathan Rauch inadvertently proves that progressive presidents were fascists.” (02/16/26)
- America’s Atomic Habits
Source: Law & Liberty
by Brian Pawlowski“Thomas Jefferson enshrined our ideals in the Declaration of Independence with words every American recognizes: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ But he immediately followed that soaring statement with something just as important: ‘That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.’ Ideals alone were never meant to stand. They required durable forms capable of securing and sustaining them. Those forms were later prescribed in the Constitution.” (02/16/26)
- No Plan for Mideast Peace Will Work, Without Recognizing Palestinians’ Full Humanity
Source: Common Dreams
by James Zogby“When President Donald Trump convened his so-called Board of Peace in Davos, Switzerland, a key item on the agenda was to endorse his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s extravagant (and, I might add, detached from reality) plan for a ‘New Gaza’. The rendering of Kushner’s scheme shows it to be more of a luxury resort for wealthy tourists than the foundation of a just future for the Palestinian victims of Israel’s genocide. But since the raison d’être of the Board of Peace was supposed to be dealing with the aftermath of Israel’s war on Gaza, the conversation, by necessity, had to address the needs of hundreds of thousands of now-homeless Palestinians. Thus, Kushner presented a proposal for a model Palestinian community (the ‘New Rafah’) he intends to build to house Palestinians in Gaza. The plans for this New Rafah have been circulated since the meeting.” (02/16/26)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/peace-palestinian-rights
- A Great Un-Finding
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob“In 2009, President Obama and the EPA decided that the will‑o’-the-wisp of fine-tuning the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere fell under the agency’s purview. They introduced a not-so-thin wedge to pry open a vast new province of regulatory oppression. Obama had sought congressional legislation, but Congress had balked. So he proceeded without any new laws; or rather, as so often happens, told an agency to issue new laws. … Now things may change. Bigly. President Trump has ordered the EPA to un-find its 2009 ‘finding’ that it has blanket authority to regulate human emission of greenhouse gases. The change will be challenged in court. The Trump administration doubtless expects — perhaps even wants — the litigation.” (02/16/26)
- Washington Post, RIP
Source: The American Conservative
by Alan Pell Crawford“No question, the Post has been a great newspaper, but, like other great newspapers, it has been hemorrhaging money for years, in part because it has been losing subscribers. It’s ironic that a lot of the people now bemoaning decisions made by the Post’s top brass are themselves no longer subscribing. After Bezos decided to pull the editorial board’s endorsement of Kamala Harris (ending a practice of endorsing presidential candidates, which it only began to do about the time [Bpb] Woodward was a Metro desk reporter), 250,000 high-minded subscribers bailed out. They did so no doubt unaware of how their decision might affect the paychecks of reporters about whom they are now expressing such heartfelt concern.” (02/16/26)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/washington-post-rip/
- The SAVE Act Presents Creates Paperwork Burdens for Some Voters
Source: Exiled Policy
by Jason Pye“Several days ago, I wrote about some of the problems the SAVE Act. Specifically, I explained that the SAVE Act marks a radical shift for Republicans. When I was the vice president for legislative affairs at FreedomWorks, I attended meetings hosted by Republican leadership in 2019 in which they railed against House Democrats’ For the People Act. They complained that various aspects of the bill violated the core tenets of federalism and that others were unconstitutional. Although the SAVE Act isn’t as comprehensive as the For the People Act, it still encroaches on an area traditionally reserved for the states.” (02/15/26)
https://exiledpolicy.substack.com/p/the-save-act-presents-creates-paperwork
- Reason Roundtable, 02/16/26
- The Political Orphanage, 02/16/26
Source: The Political Orphanage
“How to Build a Commune: Samwise Rodriguez.” (02/16/26)
https://politicalorphanage.libsyn.com/how-to-build-a-commune-samwise-rodriguez
- Ron Paul Liberty Report, 02/16/26
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Last Chance To Avoid War With Iran?” (02/16/26)
- Mean Age Daydream, 02/16/26
Source: Lions of Liberty
“‘Bigger Than Watergate’ Epstein Scandal.” (02/16/26)
https://www.lionsofliberty.com/episodes/madd-bigger-than-watergate-epstein-scandal
- The Evil Within, Part 2
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
“The National-Security State.” (02/16/26)
https://www.fff.org/freedom-in-motion/video/the-evil-within-part-2-the-national-security-state/
- Gracearchy with Jim Babka, episode 154
Source: Gracearchy with Jim Babka
“Five Things We Can Learn From The Epstein Files.” (02/16/26)
- EconTalk, 02/16/26
Source: EconTalk
“Seiko, Swatch, and the Swiss Watch Industry (with Aled Maclean-Jones).” (02/16/26)
https://www.econtalk.org/seiko-swatch-and-the-swiss-watch-industry-with-aled-maclean-jones/
- TechTank, season 5, episode 37
Source: Brookings Institution
“What to expect from the India AI Impact Summit.” (02/16/26)
https://shows.acast.com/tech-tank/episodes/what-to-expect-from-the-india-ai-impact-summit